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Post Sponsorship Report: Litecoin + UFC 232

By January 8, 2019 No Comments

What Happens When a Leading Cryptocurrency Partners with a Mainstream Brand?

It’s been a little over a week since world renown UFC announcer, Bruce Buffer, roared “Take Control of Your Money and Pay With Litecoin!” in front of the sellout crowd of 15,862 gathered at the Los Angeles Forum for what was a history making UFC 232. And what a week it’s been! 

While our sponsorship with the UFC made history — cementing Litecoin as the first cryptocurrency to partner with the UFC — the sponsorship has also provided a compelling first hand view into the role these types of initiatives can play in helping LTC drive towards mass adoption. 

There were several goals we looked to achieve from this sponsorship, including driving awareness, tapping into the UFC’s fervent worldwide community, and taking the critical first steps towards what we hope will be an evolving and fruitful relationship with this globally recognized brand.

As with any product or service, awareness is a critical component of adoption. With the transformative value proposition that Litecoin holds for the world, awareness is especially important in order to plant the first seeds for people to want to grow their knowledge and understanding of Litecoin and cryptocurrency in general. While we are hopeful that this partnership was just the beginning for UFC/LTC, we think it was a knockout for several reasons. 

Buzz, Buzz & More Buzz

The UFC 232 sponsorship was a huge milestone in itself, marking one of the largest sporting events to be sponsored by any cryptocurrency. But it also marked something more significant. As one can image, the UFC does not just accept partners or sponsorships from anybody. As the saying goes, “You’re judged by the company you keep.” The fact that such a large and recognizable brand was comfortable to draw a line in the sand and put the Litecoin logo on the canvas of the Octagon during a globally televised event, sends a very important signal of legitimacy to both the corporate world and the public.

Not surprisingly, this signal instantly created a good deal of buzz across platforms.

Twitter

Based on an analytics report from TweetBinder, the search result for ‘Litecoin UFC’ on twitter gathered over 40,697,646 impressions over the course of 7 days (between 26th to 4th January) with a potential reach of 16,035,068 unique users. The result of this term or hashtag is estimated to be around the equivalent of $80,000 in advertising dollars. And this is on Twitter alone.

The below graph shows the activity levels of contributors, original tweets, retweets, replies, links and pictures and the total number of tweets during this 7 day period.

As you can see from the above graph, the level of activity rose from when the sponsorship was announced on the 26th to the live event on the 29th. Here’s a breakdown of some of the stats: 

  • Total Tweets: 10,402 tweets.
  • Total Replies: 687 tweets.
  • Total Retweets: 7,327 retweets.
  • Total Links/pictures: 1,935 tweets.

The below graph shows the top 10 languages, sources and hashtags used during the Litecoin UFC sponsorship. With tweets coming in from multi-lingual backgrounds and across many devices this shows the global impact that the Litecoin and cryptocurrency community had over this sponsorship event.

In fact, looking deeper into the data, engagement was sparked across the globe, with countries such as: France, England, Japan, Australia, Spain, Thailand and many more, getting in on the action. 

The below tweet from Charlie Lee (@SatoshiLite) showcases how wide the Litecoin community can reach with over 238 comments, close to 4000 likes, and 1000 retweets.

Another example of the engagement and passion of the Litecoin community can be seen in this tweet from the UFC, where 37 out of 50 comments were regarding the Litecoin logo that appeared in this short clip of Woods v Ewell, which was liked over 1,124 times and retweeted 257 times. The Litecoin community made a viral impact on the clips that the Litecoin logo appeared in. This is evident by the fact that the clips that showcased more of the Litecoin logo were shared more within the cryptocurrency community.

Biggest Impact

Throughout this 7 day period, there were thousands of people engaging around the sponsorship on Twitter. Here were some of the biggest contributors:

  • Charlie Lee [LTC⚡] (@satoshilite) | 7,201,103 Impacts
  • Capitalist (@semprevitorioso) | 2,806,989 Impacts
  • Remi Vee 🛡️ (@remi_vladuceanu) | 2,390,820 Impacts
  • CoinDesk (@coindesk) | 1,548,316 Impacts
  • Warren Young (@djwarrenyoung) | 1,193,673 Impacts
  • Bruce Porter, Jr. (@networksmanager) | 864,456 Impacts
  • Buycoolprice[ŁTC] @buycoolprice | 837,000 Impacts
  • Litecoin Foundation (@ltcfoundation) | 776,574 Impacts
  • Bruce Buffer (@brucebuffer) | 774,432 Impacts
  • BitcoinAgile (@bitcoinagile) | 653,926 Impacts

Top Contributors

The highest contributors based on their followers are as follows:

  • Charlie Lee [LTC⚡ ] (@Satoshilite) | 800,123 Followers
  • CoinDesk (@coindesk) | 774,158 Followers
  • Salih SARIKAYA (@salihsarikaya) | 593,571 Followers
  • Bruce Buffer (@brucebuffer) | 258,144 Followers
  • Pomp 🌪 (@apompliano) | 180,973 Followers
  • Ben Askren (@benaskren) | 133,133 Followers
  • Sherdog by Mandatory (@sherdogdotcom) | 93,141 Followers
  • Adryenn Ashley (@adryenn) | 86,770 Followers
  • Andre F Bourque ♕ (@socialmktgfella) | 73,340 Followers
  • Chris Abraham (@chrisabraham) | 45,250 Followers

Most Mentioned Users

Moreover, there were over 3,735 profile mentions within the 7 day period, but the highest mentions in tweets are as follows:

  • @ufc | 621 Mentions | 16.63% Total
  • @satoshilite | 425 Mentions | 11.38% Total
  • @litecoin | 193 Mentions | 5.17% Total
  • @ltcfoundation | 183 Mentions | 4.90% Total
  • @criscyborg | 123 Mentions | 3.29% Total
  • @danawhite | 119 Mentions | 3.19% Total
  • @amanda_leo | 116 Mentions| 3.11% Total
  • @johnkim77 | 109 Mentions| 2.92% Total
  • @brucebuffer | 107 Mentions | 2.86% Total
  • @daddycool1991 | 78 Mentions | 2.09% Total

Google

The below graph shows the google trend search result for ‘Litecoin UFC’ between Dec 26th and Jan 4th.

Search result for ‘Litecoin UFC’ between Dec 26th — Jan 4th

As you can see, there is a positive correlation leading up to the live event on the 29th. Throughout the night, searches became more popular and hit their peak during the co-main event when Bruce Buffer announced Litecoin as the official cryptocurrency of UFC 232. This sparked many spectators and fans alike to search for ‘Litecoin’ as well as other pronunciations, such as ‘Lightcoin’ and ‘Lite Coin’ — causing it to trend on Google around the same time.

In addition, as shown in the above chart, most of the Google search results for ‘Litecoin UFC’ came from the US, with the Netherlands and Australians coming in second and third respectively. The other countries also searching for this result varied from Canada, Germany and the UK.

Moreover, most of the related topics to the Google search ‘Litecoin UFC’ were specific fighters, in particular, Cat Zingano and BJ Penn — both American Mixed Martial artists. In addition, the search was boosted from Cris Cybord and Amanda Nunes’ co-main event fight which took place right after Bruce Buffer made the announcement of the Litecoin sponsorship, which instantaneously boosted search results to 100 (These scores represent search interest relative to the highest point on the chart. 100 is the peak popularity for that term.) 

In fact, there are also over 324,000 results regarding ‘Litecoin UFC’ on Google.

Instagram/Youtube

Announcements and clips of the fights were also posted on Facebook, Instagram & Youtube, furthering the reach of the Litecoin logo.

This post by jiujtuparamulheres shows the Litecoin logo during the co-main fight between Nunes and Cybor has currently over 47,271 views:

This post from viaplaysportse, with over 10,057 views.

And this post here by CryptoShare which announced the UFC 232 sponsorship with the Litecoin Foundation on the 27th  of December and has more than 1,277 likes and many thousands of views.

Youtube has also been buzzing with excitement — with over 48 videos posted in the past 7 days ranging from announcements, to debates, discussions and critiques of the sponsorship.

Some notable videos which gained a lot of exposure, include:

Made by The Modern Investor with over 14,427 views. As well as the following below by 크립토 토마토CRYPTO tomato with over 7,536 views:

In addition, our friends over at Crypto Capital Venture did a live stream which currently has over 5,000 views, here, discussing the UFC 232 sponsorship deal with Litecoin Foundation members.

The result of all this combined effort allowed Litecoin to enter the centre stage at full throttle. 

Traditional & Digital Media

While mainstream media interest in cryptocurrency has certainly tempered since the meteoric rise of Bitcoin in 2017, publications came out of the woodwork to cover the news of Litecoin as the official cryptocurrency of UFC 232. Given the intersection of crypto and sports, the coverage covered a nice array of outlets.

From CoinDesk and Cointelgraph, to MMA outlets like Sherdog, and business publications like Cheddar and the New York Business Journal, there was no shortage of organic media coverage. And while the value of this type of publicity can be estimated in ad dollar equivalencies, the true value lies in exchanges like these.

Invaluable Networking

As we stated above, this sponsorship sent a significant message across the industry . Sharing the canvas with credible brands such as Harley Davidson, Monster Energy and Modelo provide immeasurable amounts of validity.

As part of the sponsorship, there were a few Litecoin Foundation members on-site, including Charlie Lee who were there to to meet with the UFC representatives face-to-face and network with other partners and sponsors who were also in attendance. 

Meeting Bruce Buffer (UFC Announcer).

Meeting the folks from PokerStars — another UFC 232 sponsor.

And many more behind-the-scenes!

Global Exposure

UFC 232 was a highly anticipated event with over nine fights, including the much anticipated return of Jon Jones, in a long-awaited rematch against Alexander Gustafssonat. The UFC 232 fight card is speculated to be the second highest pay-per-view of the year, where the highest obtained more than 1.6 million unique views. Moreover, the UFC reaches around 1.1 billion households in over 180 countries around the world every year.

Having the Litecoin logo displayed on the canvas as millions of people watched the event live, and millions more continue to see clips post fight, gives Litecoin a truly global stage.

Litecoin’s Day in the Octagon:

Early Prelims:

  • Curtis Millender (USA) v Siyar Bahadurzada (AFG)

  • Uriah Hall (JAM) v Bevon Lewis (USA)

  • Nathaniel Wood (UK) v Andre Ewell (USA)

Prelims:

  • Douglas Silva de Andrade (Brazil) v Petr Yan (RUS)

  • Cat Zingano (USA) v Megan Anderson (AUS)

  • Andrei Arlovski (BEL) v Walt Harris (USA)

Main card:

  • Corey Anderson (USA) v Ilir Latifi (SWE)

  • Carlos Condit (USA) v Michael Chiesa (USA)

  • Cris Cyborg (BRA) v Amanda Nunes (BRA)

  • Jon Jones (USA) v Alexander Gustafsson (SWE)

Opening the Door to New Possibilities

While some of these measurable results are extremely important, the opportunity this sponsorship has already created for LTC is hard to understate. While we have been fortunate to command steady interest from some great brands over the last couple of years, the ilk of globally recognizable brands that are reaching out to the foundation since UFC 232 has increased dramatically. Of course, not every partnership will make sense, but where there are ways to spark awareness amongst large swaths of the globe, activate the public, or create new and exciting use cases, we will continue to evaluate these.

As for the UFC, we plan to continue to discuss how to move this partnership forward in new and exciting ways. As this evolves, we will keep you posted.

Stay tuned!

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